


Buff n' Stuff

by raendown



Category: Naruto
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-07
Updated: 2017-09-09
Packaged: 2018-12-24 23:39:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12023499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raendown/pseuds/raendown
Summary: He isn't the one she might expect to knock on her door at three in the morning. In the end she's glad that he did.





	1. Chapter 1

The too-loud knocking at three in the morning is, unfortunately, not an unfamiliar part of her day. What is unfamiliar is that it’s not Naruto or Ino on the other side of the door when she finally answers it. Instead, she is greeted with an unfamiliar head of silver hair that obscures one eye and leaves the other to stare down at her, glossy and unfocused and still managing to smolder. Sakura opens her mouth to say something, then closes it again and swallows thickly because that is the sexist smile she’s ever seen and the splash of bashful red across those alabaster cheeks is nothing less than adorable.

The man towers over her and yet somehow carries the look of a woeful puppy as he leans heavily against her doorframe and chuckles. Sakura’s insides jump and twist at the deep, smoky sound of it and it’s all she can do to keep her hands off of the chest underneath that sinfully tight shirt. 

“Maa-” the stranger starts to say, then cuts himself off with a hiccup. Sakura blinks in surprise just as the smell of beer wafts towards her. Her delectable stranger is _hammered_.

“Can I help you…?” she managed to ask. The man closes his visible eye and it turns up a little in a cute, abashed smile.

“You-you’re Sakura right? Yeah! Yeah you live next door!” Lurching away from her doorframe, the man points vaguely down the hall. “Always see you coming back from the gym. You’re all…buff and stuff! Need help. Help a neighbor out?”

His voice is as deep and smoky as his laugh had been and Sakura would be soaked through her panties already if she weren’t currently caught halfway between amusement and annoyance. She fixes the man with one of her patented Looks™, eyebrow raised, arms crossed, and hip cocked. Instead of cowering like Naruto would have, the man leans in a little closer and shoves something in her direction with one hand.

“I’m _hungry_. And it won’t _open_. And Gai went missing.” He says three short sentences, pairing them with the cutest pout she’s ever seen, and Sakura melts. Then she looks down and sees what he is holding out.

It’s a jar of pickles. The neighbor who has lived next to her for four years yet managed to never cross her path is standing outside her door at three in the morning asking her to open a jar of pickles. Sakura stares. And blinks. And then blinks again for good measure. Neither the pickles nor the drunken man in front of her disappears.

“I’m sorry, did you call me buff?”

“Oh, yeah!” Her neighbor nods enthusiastically. “ _Real_ buff. You could probably bench press _me_!” He looks intriguingly excited by the idea. In fact, his blush deepens just a few more shades as his eyes drop to her biceps, at rest yet still pleasantly shapely.

“I suppose I could,” she agrees slowly, a little thrown. It's so hard to find a guy who isn’t put off by how much she loves to work out. And here one has shown up all on his own, delivered himself right to her doorstep looking like a tall glass of water. She sighs internally. Knowing her luck, he probably has a girlfriend.

“Which means you can _definitely_ open this. Pleeeaaase? I am literally actually starving. To death. Death by starving. Starvation? One of those.”

Sakura bites her lip to keep in the giggles as she snatches the jar of pickles out of the man’s hand, twisting the top. In all fairness, it truly is a very tight lid. She actually has to put a little effort in to popping it off and her neighbor breaks out in a giant smile as the scent of pickles joins the fumes of beer rolling off of him.

“You’re _awesome_!” he declares, leaning forward to buss her cheek without warning. He snatches his jar from her suddenly nerveless fingers and turns away, already digging out one of his treasures.

“Wait!” Sakura cries, making him turn back after making it a wobbly four steps away. He makes a curious noise and crunches on a pickle while blinking at her. “I, uh, I didn’t catch your name? It seems unfair that you know mine.”

“Kakashi! My name is Kakashi!” He waves with the rest of the pickle he is holding. Sakura smiles. He’s just too cute for his own good.

“How come I never see you around, Kakashi?” she asks. He blushes and laughs nervously.

“Ah, I always hide when you’re coming,” he admits, hiccupping lightly again. “You’re so pretty. And strong. And pretty. And I’ve never been good at talking to pretty people.”

Sakura is too stunned to reply, left standing there with her jaw gaping as Kakashi staggers back in to his own apartment and shuts the door behind himself. That living deity has been living only a wall away from her for four years and they’ve never spoken because he’s too shy? Because _he_ thinks _she_ is pretty? She feels a little drunk herself as she wobbles back to her bed and crashes down upon the soft covers.

By the time she drifts off to sleep, Sakura has already planned, edited, and revised what she is going to say tomorrow when she knocks on Kakashi’s door to ask him out on a date. She’ll show up late to give his hangover time to dull down. And she’ll wear something that shows off her arms.

Her last thought before falling asleep is that this was definitely worth getting woken up at three in the morning for.


	2. Chapter 2

Sakura knows for a good fact that her neighbor lives alone. There is absolutely no way two people could live on the other side of such a thin wall in an apartment no bigger than her own and never make so much as a peep. It isn’t possible. Not unless both of them are deaf and mute and pass their days doing nothing but reading braille. So she really doesn’t expect someone other than Kakashi to open the door.

Which is why she is stunned in to silence and fails to react like a proper human being when she knocks on his door around dinner time and is greeted with the sight of a massive man wearing a too-wide smile nearly as bright as his neon green vest top.

“Good evening!” he greets her in a voice that echoes off the walls of the hallway. She almost feels as though her very bones have been rattled. She barely resists covering her ears as the man turns and calls in to the apartment. “My eternal rival! You have company!”

“I don’t _care_ ,” a half-familiar voice comes from somewhere just out of sight. “I’m busy _dying_. Keep your stinking voice down Gai, for god’s sake. Have a heart you monster.”

Sakura bites her lip, quelling the giggles that are threatening to burst forth. It seems as though Kakashi isn’t feeling better yet. He must not be a drinker usually, to still be that sick this late the day after. Her smile is wide as she leans around the doorjamb and tries to spot the man she came looking for. The living room is surprisingly neat for a bachelor living alone, though dark at the moment with the blinds drawn and no sign of its occupant. The back of a blue couch faces her and she guesses that’s where he is hidden.

“Still not feeling well Kakashi?” She says, pitching her voice just loud enough to be heard.

A messy head of silver hair pops up above the back of the couch like a terrified Meer cat, eyes wide as he looks around frantically before freezing upon catching sight of her standing in his doorway.

“ _What_!?” His voice squeaks on the single word he manages to squeeze out. Sakura waves.

“Did you enjoy your pickles?”

“ _What_!?”

Her gaze turns to the man in bright green who is still beaming down on her with a smile so big it looks like it might hurt him. He’s an absolute mountain of a man, just as muscled as her but with a lot more height and width. She distantly wonders which gym he frequents.

“You must be Gai, then. I’m glad he found you after all.”

“ _What_!?”

“He doesn’t process well when he’s hung over does he?”

Gai booms out a laugh. “Indeed, you have caught my eternal rival unawares. May I offer you a beverage, Miss Sakura?”

He is loud but incredibly charming, the gentle giant sort. Sakura shakes her head politely and watches him turn towards the small kitchenette which mirrors her own in shape and layout. In a flash Kakashi has leaped over the back of the couch and thrown himself at his friend to whisper frantically. Sakura just barely manages to catch what he is hissing under his breath.

“What are you doing? Don’t be a freak, we aren’t supposed to know her _name_! God, this is why I never let you come over here.”

“But Kakashi, she knows ours!” This made the other man freeze in place.

“Oh my god, you’re right! How does she know my _name_?”

“Ah, you told me your name last night,” Sakura pipes up helpfully.

Kakashi spins around to stare at her again. His hair is absolutely wild, standing nearly straight up on the top of his head, but his face isn’t any less gorgeous from having spent the night a few too many bottles deep and crashing on the couch. A pretty blush spreads rapidly across his cheeks while he looks at her like a startled rabbit.

“I – oh. What? I didn’t…do anything embarrassing did I?” He rubs at the nape of his neck in a nervous gesture that makes her want to press him against a wall and kiss him until he can’t think straight.

“You showed up at my door at three in the morning and asked me to open your jar of pickles. Evidently you were hungry and I’m ‘all buff and stuff’.” Sakura makes no effort to hide her amusement, enjoying the way Kakashi’s blush quickly takes over the rest of his face. He looks almost ready to faint so she takes mercy on him. “I thought you were really cute.”

“You did?” he asks faintly, obviously hardly able to believe her words. Sakura nods, leaning casually against the doorframe and crossing her arms. The position makes her biceps shift and bulge out and she revels in the way his eyes drop to watch the show. She’s so glad she remembered to wear something sleeveless.

“It’s too bad you aren’t feeling better. I was going to ask if you wanted to go get something to eat.”

Kakashi can’t seem to decide between breathing, standing straight, or processing her words properly. It’s evident that he cannot do all three things at once as his jaw hinges and works soundlessly, throat convulsing and weight swaying back on his heels. She’s never seen a man so stunned to be asked to dinner and her ego purrs quietly, puffing up like an arrogant bird of prey.

“Like a date?” her neighbor blurts out, making her smile widen until it rivals Gai’s.

“Yeah, like a date.”

“Does…is tomorrow okay?” He’s listing dangerously to one side and doesn’t seem to notice but Sakura isn’t going to be the one to point it out. She’s willing to bet that it’s shock that’s knocking him over more so than anything else. Over in the kitchen she can see Gai nearly vibrating with contained energy and tries hard not to look, lest she become its focus.

“Tomorrow works perfectly,” she replies with half-lidded eyes and another flex of her arms. Kakashi whimpers quietly under his breath. “I’ll pick you up at seven.”

With a wiggle of her fingers Sakura lets herself out and closes the door. Then she counts the seconds on her fingers. She only makes it to two and a half, not even enough time to make it back to her own apartment, when a giant voice fills the entire hallway.

“Congratulations my rival! At long last your secret love returns your desire!”

“Shut _up_! She’ll _hear_ you!”

Her laughter joins the echoes of their voices as she enters her home and heads for her closet, already trying to decide what she’s going to wear for her first date with what may very well be her perfect man.


End file.
